A SITE FOR THE ULTIMATE PIANO CONNOISSEUR

When I started this piano website, I had it in mind to deal with
everything that was the classical piano. But in the 4 years since I
began this odyssey I have discovered many things, not the least of which
is what interests me most. And so, I will continue to offer pages on
great pianists and composers of the past and present, I will continue my
advocacy of wonderful women pianists, and I will continue my
exploration of comparative interpretation of favorite works.

Of all of these, I am perhaps most passionate about presenting
specific pieces performed by many different pianists. I believe that
until one has gotten past the performance and interpretation through
which one fell in love with a piece of music, and heard it played by
numerous pianists, each of whom with his own vision and understanding of
what the music has to say, one does not really know the music but only
the music as interpreted by a particular pianist. Holding on to that
performance as an absolute standard prevents one from hearing all that
the music has to offer and worse, prevents one from enjoying the often
fascinating and exhilarating different approaches other pianists take in
interpreting the same music.

Do I have favorites? You bet I do. Do they change? Absolutely.
Are there some interpretations that I do not like or enjoy? Yes, and I
am not loathe to say so. But the purpose of this site is not to
criticize, rather to celebrate this wonderful instrument, the music that
has been composed for it, and the people who play it so beautifully.

As I said, the creation of this website has been, and continues
to be, an odyssey. And like Odysseus, I landed on an island for an
adventure that was unrelated to my original quest. I took time off to
write a novel, a murder mystery with a musical polemic. In the end,
this adventure turned out to be an inevitable and important part of my
musical journey. I have written what I am told is quite a good book,
entertaining and informative, and to those for whom the performance of
music is as critically important to their own quality of life as it is
to mine, it is an important book. I take the liberty of adding access
to it, and to the second in the series, on the pages of this site in the
hope that it will be read and enjoyed by many.

For those of you who enjoy murder mysteries, here is my first with a strong musical polemic as background